Orientation and Friends!

Saturday was grad school orientation. I was excited to see the new oh so talked about campus, meet people and get this show on the road. Apparently and ironically that after moving across two continents, I was nervous, because I couldn’t fall asleep last night. Nerves? Heat? Jetlag? Who knows…

The new campus is huge and beautiful!! Literally on the desert it’s covered by a huge blue sky and surrounded by a constant grey border where desert winds meet sand. While it could easily resemble a fake backdrop in a mall photobooth, it is beautiful! When one looks past campus landscaping a grey wall appears to almost cut off the rest of the world. I’m excited to be part of it!

I’ve yet to see the ‘old’ campus in downtown Cairo. Most of my classes will be downtown while the law library, professors offices, the gym and university activity is at the New Campus. Not as convenient as I anticipated and hoped for especially w/ only AUC buses to transport us the 1-2 hour commute each way (depending on traffic). As always, we’ll make do.


For those of you who have ever moved before, especially to a foreign land with a foreign language, you can empathize with the sentiments of having to create an entirely new friends/family network. For those of you who have not moved, well, its a bit unstable. You find yourself waiting in lines, climbing stairs, craving coffee, wiping sweat next to a stranger and you realize that first impressions are a rather big deal and that you have an entirely clean slate. NO ONE knows you or where your from or what you've done etc. Its quite an exhilerating opportunity to (re)define oneself.



After finding the room of International Human Rights Law people— my new colleagues, some conversations quickly started up, other awkwardly stumbled. “So, where you from?” “where'd you do your undergrad degree” is how it usually starts and then we basically come to the conclusion that non of us have much in common except the fact that we’re alone in Cairo and looking for friends. That in and of itself is basis enough to start a “friendship” and now I can actually scroll through my cell phone contact page!! It was fun to hear where people have studied, what languages they speak, what brings them to Cairo etc. I’m excited to start a program with such a diverse group of people, with diverse travel histories, language experiences and independent goals!